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I did a 10-hour round trip on Madiba’s birthday, the 18th of July, to Giyani in Limpopo to witness and participate in the launch of the Nelson Mandela Career Guidance Campaign by the Department of Higher Education (DHE). 10 schools from around Limpopo attended the launch, and I estimate that 3 000 pupils attended. The launch was lead by DHE Minister Dr Blade Nzimande, supported by his Director General, Professor Mary Metcalfe. Also in attendance were the heavyweights in the higher education fraternity such as Umalusi CEO, Dr Mafu Rakometsi and the various SETA’s.

I contributed my 67 minutes in line with theme of the day by joining the bubbly Ms Rhulani Baloyi where we spoke about career choices in Communications with the learners interested in this field. I was glad I spent the time giving back, but it hit me yet again that a lot more needs to be done to make career information available to the learners generally, and especially those from rural areas.

As part of my purpose for attending the launch, I collected tons of career-related books and brochures. I was amazed at the amount of information that is available in the market, but learners continue to be none the wiser as I pointed out above.

The only explanation for the paradox above is that available information is not easily accessible, and/or it is not properly packaged given the profile of targeted readers. Let’s face it, learners generally do not like reading hordes of “serious material”. Give them Daily Sun, Sunday World or People Magazine and you are talking their language.

The $1 million question then is, how else can the same valuable information be packaged and distributed in such a way that it hits the same chord? Now, therein lies the business idea.